DAVY, PETER, MIKE & MICKY ARE HOME AGAIN! BUT CAROL DECK REPORTS HOW SAD HOLLYWOOD WAS WHILE THEY WERE ON TOUR!
Good Grief, as they say in “Peanuts,” if I had realized that when they said the Monkees would be gone, on tour, for months, they meant it, I would have worked on conniving a way of going with them (well, OK, so I did do some conniving, I mean I would have worked harder at it).
It seems like it’s been years rather than weeks since they were home. I go by the Monkee set every now and then just in hopes of finding a stray Monkee or two, but it’s always the same. The set just sits there, quiet, collecting dust.
Behind the scenes all kinds of people are preparing things for the Monkees’ return. The script writers are writing scripts for next season, though they know that Davy, Micky, Mike and Peter will just ignore them and improvise the whole series anyway.
The property crew is busy constructing sets for the guys to play around in. The guys I call set searchers are out looking for groovy places to shoot the episodes that aren’t filmed at the studio. You know—things like lakes and big white houses and streetcars and trees and groovy things like that.
The director and producer are still arguing over what direction the series should go in—more drama, less drama, more romance, less romance, etc.
The casting department is selecting the lucky people who will appear with the Monkees. And the great hunt continues to find girls shorter than Davy.
But the Monkee set is so sad. It just sits there, chairs strewn everywhere, props leaning against walls and equipment collecting dust. Occasionally someone from a nearby set will stroll through on their way to the commissary, but otherwise there’s rarely anyone there.
While the filming has ceased while the Monkees are touring, the recording hasn’t. Their producer, Chip Douglas—his real name is Douglas Farthing Hatlelid, but who would put a name like that on such a good lookin’ guy?—is flying in to meet the guys in Chicago, New York and Nashville, to record their followup album to “Headquarters.”
I tried to coerce him into taking me too, but failed there too. I guess I just wasn’t fated to make this tour. Somebody up there is punishing me by making me stay in this city without the Monkees.
Since I couldn’t go with them, all I have to go on is reports from people who have seen them on tour.
Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart told me before they left on their tour that they would be meeting up with the Monkees several times, so I immediately cornered them as soon as they returned and demanded a report.
The told me pretty much what I expected—The Monkees are tired! Tommy and Bobby reported that they are always a little tired on tour, but they take it pretty well.
“They have to take everything pretty lightly on the road or they’d go crazy,” they said.
They’d go crazy! What about all us here in Hollywood, with no Monkees?
Anyway Tommy and Bobby saw them in both New York and Miami and assured me that all four of them are alive and will return soon.
Meanwhile, I guess I’ll just go back to ye old Monkee set and sit in a corner and sulk.
